We actually had no idea until recently that we’ve been nominated as the top 5 podcast on the singapore blog aggregator Ping.sg! So help vote for us! We’re known as “Tech65 by 65bits” (I know it’s reversed, but we never expected to do more than 65bits when we first joined Ping.sg…) in the nomination page.
Thanks so much for your support and your votes!!
Daniel Tsou
I’m actually surprised no one has noticed this yet. Blizzard unveiled Diablo III today at the Blizzard Entertainment Worldwide Invitational. I could dig up all the new features of Diablo III and tell them to you, but where’s the fun in that?
Here’s the link to the Official Diablo 3 website to discover for yourself
And here’s a summary of the new game:
Twenty years have passed since the cataclysmic events of Diablo® II. Mephisto, Diablo, and Baal have been defeated, but the Worldstone, which once shielded the world of Sanctuary from the forces of both the High Heavens and the Burning Hells, has been destroyed, and evil once again stirs in Tristram….
Jerrick and NTT will definitely have lots to say about this new game on Episode 78 of 65bits… 
Anyone who’s interested in getting a brand new copy of easySafe, your key to data security, are asked to simply leave a comment at the bottom of this post, with your name and a valid email address. Yes that’s all you have to do. Leave a comment. That’s ALL! And you’ll have a REALLY good chance of winning this wonderful little present, keeping YOU safe, and keeping US afloat! So what are you waiting for just post up!
Hi everyone!
Tech65.org is finally back online for SingNet users! We’ve put together a compilation of all the episodes of Channel65 and 65bits that you probably have missed just for you!
What Happened
If you are a SingNet user, we apologise for the downtime Tech65.org has been having the past few weeks. Something happened over at SingNet that prevented SingNet users from accessing the website unless you had set up your computer to manually connect to SingNet’s proxy server or DNS server. We have been working hard the past few weeks trying to figure out what was wrong, but after a phone call with SingNet, they finally fixed the connection at their side and brought the website back online. On behalf of the Tech65.org crew, I want to thank all of you for your patience, and thank SingNet for their assistance.
What you’ve missed:
The Fiat 500 or in its original Italian, the Cinquecento is a beautiful example of modern engineering from an inspired original, the modern 500 is by no means a compromised or even cheap descendant of the Nuova 500. To put it in a more poetic form, whereas the Nuova 500 was designed to be practical, and functional first, much like your dressed down mother who raised you through two economic recessions and does not really see the point of getting anything for form. Whilst the modern 500 is your little sister, raised in the internet age, savvy, smart, with some money to spend, and she’s all about fashion, looks, but wants stuff to have all the luxuries. Jerrick, our intrepid editor attended the Singapore launch of the 500 and survived to tell the tale.
This, the first in possibly a series of articles by a friend of our humble website, Naveen. Comment up!
When Apple announced there was something in the Air, it wasn’t the only one. Adobe recently launched its own lightweight cross-platform runtime, also named AIR. Deceptive pun indeed, it expands to Adobe Integrated Runtime. What does it do?
Well firstly, AIR itself can be thought of as an emulator. It emulates in this case browser technology. Once the basic runtime is installed, AIR applications can be downloaded [the proverbial ROMs] and you can run them on any platform with AIR installed, be it Mac, Windows and Linux [coming soon].
What’s special about AIR is that it emulates a browser [WebKit rendering, the same technology as Safari and Opera], and it follows that AIR applications are Rich Internet Applications, similar to Firefox extensions, only now masquerading as fullblown applications on your desktop.
The applications can be written in any web language, Flash or even Adobe Flex.
People usually dismiss the potential of Rich Internet Applications, I find, but with the advent of the Software as a Service paradigm, rich Internet applications are no-install, quick-deploy shock troops in the Internet realm now. Visit any page with even a teeny bit of Javascript and that’s lite programming at work. The benefits are undeniable; most of the interactivity you now see on webpages is asynchrous and you customise the page and services you want with minimal fuss server-side. The processor power and bandwidth they save empowers them to offer the same services to more people, with lesser downtime.
While the AIR concept sounds similar to Google Gears, the fundamental difference is the need for a browser for the latter. Google Gears only caches the database data with SQLite and simulates a server-side environment so your online service [like Google Reader] works offline. In terms of functionality, I’d say AIR is similar to Microsoft’s Silverlight and the not yet released Mozilla Prism.
I haven’t tried too many AIR applications; there aren’t very many available right now. Just under 50 AIRplications available in the Marketplace [a misnomer; they're all free!] and not every one of them is going to appeal to everyone. What I can recommend to you, in this Youtube age, is RichFLV.
This app has liberated me, changed how I work with .flv files that I routinely download from the Internet.
It offers rich editing [true cut and paste] and rearragements of Cuepoints, exporting of the audio track to mp3 form, taking screenshots, converting the flv to SWF format; all this and more without breaking a sweat. If nothing else, it’s a responsive offline FLV player. Highly recommended!
Other apps worthy of download would be CleVR Stitcher [allows quick stitching of photos to make a panorama], MeeBone [Meebo for the desktop; MSN connectivity without the bloatware!] and Fotobooth [named after Apple's Photobooth with pretty much the same functionality].
If you couldn’t tell by now, most of these applications occupy niche areas, in true scratch-an-itch fashion. And by leveraging their strongest suit, these AIRplications finally bring you the power of mashups to the desktop without the bulk of traditional equivalents. Hats off, Adobe.
Class, this is your assignment for today. YOU have to read through all the stories below, and prepare for the discussion during tomorrow’s live recording. If you are unable to answer our questions tomorrow, you WILL BE made the the outstanding student (the student standing outside the class)…
We expect all students to be badly behaved, and participate in the discussions impolitely and rant about things… You will be graded on your performance.
1. April Fools Panks on the Interweb.
Engadget
Engadget vs T-Mobile (Apparently not a joke. More on that tomorrow.)
Blizzard
Tauren Marine
Pinata Loot
Bard Class Hero in WoW
Ping.sg’s “Whose pong is it anyway” game
iPhoneDev team
iPhone Dev Team quits.
2. Unlimited Tunes from Apple? Not So Fast
Rumors of a new music service appear to be just that
3. Vista Issues
Early adopter’s issues.
Nvidia driver issues.
4. Creative to sell company HQ for $180m
Creative will sell HQ building and rent it back to save $$
5. Creative Goes After Driver Modder
Creative stops distribution of home grown vista driver.
Driver author responds.
6. Eeee PC Updates: New models and SDK
New 9″ Eee PC wth touchscreen?
Eee PC SDK out soon.
7. Fari and Jerrick’s Experience at M$’s Xbox 360 Event.
Check out that Riff!!!
8. Byte of the Week : Adobe Photoshop Express
Photoshop on the Web!
___________________________________________________________________
For those who missed the other posts, the details of the live recording are follows.
65th Episode of 65Bits Podcast.
Date: Saturday, April 5, 2008
Time: 10:00am - 12:00pm
Location: Geek Terminal
Street: 55, Market Street (Near Raffles Place MRT, opp. Golden Shoe Complex)
City/Town: Singapore, Singapore.
Hello our little Minions,
We the lord-masters of Tech65 have noticed that there are two other compelling events happening on 29 March at what would be the same time as our Live Recording of Episode 65. In light of this startling revelation, we should’ve smote those who dare defy us but have decided in our magnanimity to forgive them their sin and move our 65th Episode to another glorious date: April 5 2008.
It may sadden you the piteous and yet hardy folk who listen to our show that we will however be skipping this week’s podcast, and take a well earned rest, to recharge and savor the fruits of our labors. Also some of us will be attending the other events on the 29th, so expect us to grace you with our presences.
You, humble listener have no choice but to attend on the 5th of April, any excuses will not be tolerated and shall be dealt with with SlaveMaster Farinelli’s Whip of Temerity, Point Guard Jerrick’s Stiletto of Blind Justice, Flautist Daniel’s Double Bass of Resonance, Defenestrator NTT’s Ten Thousand Spikes of the Coconut Tree, and Getaway Car Driver Kai Yi’s Old Laptop of Split Coffee.
Meanwhile, You are commanded to check out the alternate events on the 29th of March:
With us, Getting the 64 essential vitamins just isn’t enough. Not when you’re camped out at some different location, discussing tech and driving away the frightened townspeople. Particularly when we begin to rail and flail against the local media for its irresponsible reporting and so on. We look at Apple extensively, see that the first Service Pack for Vista is out (more on that… later), and most importantly, give you an interesting way to save some cash. Lastly, all of us @ Tech65 strongly encourage everyone to protect yourselves with Gadgetrack, because if you don’t look good, well than change your hair product.
PS. 65th Coming Up. *Jerrick breaks out the Farinelli Wasting Device, Vodka and its little brother, Rum*
Sincerely,
Stare AT US!
Nokia came up with this new concept called “Morph”, based on Nanotechnology. This phone is foldable, transparent, self-cleaning, stretchable, self-charging… Nokia thinks we’ll probably see it in 7 years. Yep, and in 7 years, all cars will fly. Until we see a working prototype, I think this could be a cool prop for the next sci-fi movie.
